Children and Youth
- pupils in Sri Lanka. photo: Sophie Lizares-Bodegon/UEM
The work with children and young people comes under the UEM’s Desk for Women, Youth and Children. The UEM strives to strengthen the significance of children and to emphasise their rights; for in many of the countries where the UEM works, children play a very secondary role in their societies and are rarely given the opportunity to develop their abilities and gifts to the full.
The UEM regularly organises a series of projects and programmes for children and young people in Germany, Africa and Asia.
»Youth for children«
In this context the international UEM programme “Youth for Children” has been running since 2002.
In 2005 for example, 14 young people from Germany, Indonesia, the Congo, the Philippines and Sri Lanka renovated a school in Sri Lanka, which had been damaged very badly by the tsunami, within the framework of this programme. In previous years several-week work camps had taken place in Indonesia and Namibia where young people had renovated kindergarten, built playgrounds and helped with lessons.
Ecumenical Residential Community
The Ecumenical Residential Community also focuses on children’s rights as one of its topics. The participants from Germany, Africa and Asia are trained to be advocates for the rights of children in their churches during their six-month stay in the Philippines and in Germany, so that when they return home they can be better advocates for the interests of children and come out firmly in favour of their rights. “In many churches is Asia and Africa the children's work of the church still mainly consists of Sunday School and Bible camps. But that is not enough. Today there are street children, children working in factories, prostitutes and Aids orphans – whom we hardly reach at all,” says Sonia Parera-Hummel, who has been the Secretary for Women, Youth and Children for the UEM from 2001 to March 2007.
International Consultation for Children's Rights
- photo: Jürgen Borchardt/UEM
In May 2005 the Desk organised an international consultation for children’s rights in Wuppertal. Around 30 experts, both full-time staff and voluntary workers from more than 20 UEM member churches took part. It was the first consultation on this subject, and concerned itself mainly with the correlation between the biblical message and the demands of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. The churches had closed their eyes long enough towards children’s suffering and their needs, said Sonia Parera-Hummel. »Many non-government organisations take care of children, while we as churches mainly limit ourselves to those who are able to make it to Sunday School.«
Since the beginning of the 1990s, together with other organisations the UEM has taken a firm stand for the rights of children in its work for human rights.
Youth Choir, Indonesia